Stan Kroenke: Arsenal’s Re-ignition?
Reclusive, fame avoiding and quiet; an unusual yet sinister combination for your modern day owner of a top world football team.
These are the qualities of Stan Kroenke, a small American businessman who grew up in Missouri but owns a number of sports enterprises across the world. He rarely speaks to the media and has little say in the day-to-day running of his teams, qualities that are different to the meddling likes of Roman Abramovich and Mike Ashley.
Kroenke has sneaked his way onto the Board of Directors at Arsenal and as of April 2011, he owned just over 60% of the club before initiating a complete takeover which left the club valued at £731 million. However, it has been a controversial process and is still stuck with the same tag, as well as the hot discussion of what Kroenke can do to put Arsenal back to their very best.
Firstly, there is the case of Alisher Usmanov, Kroenke’s nearest rival to taking over Arsenal. After Kroenke’s overall takeover was confirmed, Usmanov spent over £100,000 gaining six more shares in the club, after it was confirmed that Kroenke had a controlling stake and intended to buy the remaining shares for a complete takeover. Usmanov is refusing to budge in terms of Kroenke’s takeover, so could there be a future conflict boiling up behind the scenes at Arsenal? Matters such as this Usmanov/Kroeneke conflict bid only further boost the controversy, although it is highly unlikely that anything will come of it for Silent Stan has enough of a stake in the club. The foundations for problems are in place though, only time will tell what will come of it.
There is further conflict from the smaller shareholders at the club, namely the AST which is the Arsenal Supporters Trust, which owns 6% of the clubs shares. As a majority shareholder, Kroenke has a lot of power on the board and the smaller shareholders become more and more intimidated by this control. The group have approached Kroenke to tell them what his intentions are and that he is not going to override their shares and siphon off profits for his own benefit. This is the case for many club owners nowadays, with the Glazer’s at Manchester United being a fine example after they have stacked hundreds of millions of pounds worth of debt onto the club. It is a worry for all at the AST as well as other minority shareholders and the last thing you want on a Board of Directors is a rift. Kroenke will need to play his cards right in order to maintain his aims at the club.
In terms of the football club, Kroenke has not been so silent, making a number of statements pledging his support for the club, manager and his intentions for the future of Arsenal. He has already stated that: “Arsenal is a fantastic club with a special history and tradition and a wonderful manager in Arsene Wenger.
“We intend to build on this rich heritage and take the club to new success.”
In response to this statement, the fans and the club should be more than simply re-assured. If Kroenke sticks to this promise then the club will inevitably be back to it’s past glory days with the likes of Patrick Vieira and Thierry Henry helping to produce a 49 game unbeaten run and various trophies.
Cesc Fabregas, someone who is becoming increasingly influential at Arsenal by the day, has already spoken about Kroenke and what he hopes. Fabregas is becoming more and more open with his thoughts, being openly critical of his fellow colleagues. He has already said to Kroenke that Arsenal need to spend big or face more and more years of being left out of the lime light. He said that the club “value other things” and has said that for years he’s spoken about how they’re “playing well, but not winning things” which is a fair enough judgement to make. With a move to Barcelona for Fabregas becoming increasingly likely, another trophy-free season at the Emirates will definitely do nothing to help keep him at the club. Kroenke needs to offer big cash for Wenger to spend on new players in order to push Arsenal enough to win that ever eluding piece of silverware.
However, with recent matches being a perfect example, the club look likely to be going nowhere in the near future. A 3-3 draw with Tottenham from a 3-1 lead shows exactly where Arsenal are lacking, as well as their breakdown in composure to cost them 3 points against Liverpool with only a few minutes left on the clock. These 4 points dropped would have put them within touching distance of the Premier League title alongside Manchester United, but now they look to have fallen by the wayside.
With this problem clear, Arsene Wenger seems to also be a problem. No-one can deny his passion for the club and the cause, but his behaviour in recent games has been detrimental. It seems as though an attitude of “everyone else’s fault but mine” has been adopted, with his lack of respect to Kenny Dalglish and Harry Redknapp in these two respective matches being more than just evident and not a great example for the club. He should attack the problems within his own dressing room and look at why these matches keep going from winning positions to points lost. This, once again, is where the statements of Cesc Fabregas come back into contention. He has recently stated that Wenger “would have been sacked years ago” if Arsenal were in Spain. He wants Kroenke to help develop the club a ruthless streak in order to reach success at the highest level.
Kroenke has already stated that he will provide money for Wenger to spend but Wenger seems adamant not to spend big. When asked by the London Evening Standard about buying new players, he responded with: “On a day-to-day basis, nothing has changed. We will continue to run the club like it has been done until now. That means live within our resources, produce our own resources and develop our team.
“On the football side of things we will continue to focus on the way we want to play to develop our players. We are in a strong position, have a good philosophy and will continue to develop that.”
Wenger has clearly gone against what Fabregas wants, which is the right decision for no player is bigger than the club they are at. However, this policy of Wenger’s has produced five unsuccessful years and it is something which Kroenke may choose to comment upon.
All in all, Kroenke is going to provide the resources for Arsenal to be a big club once again, but it is whether Wenger will use them in the right situations and with the correct policies that will determine Arsenal’s success. There could be big changes at hand in the coming seasons, perhaps a new manager or captain will be in store as Fabregas becomes more and more disheartened, but only time will tell. Time at the moment suggests a promising future for Arsenal and it could be an interesting summer for Wenger and his squad.
